Playful Spring Cupcakes

 

I made these playful cupcakes for the students with special needs to sell on their coffee cart at school.   I was worried that the icing would turn the students mouths different colors but the students loved them and they were gone within 5 minutes. 

Give them a try!

Ice cupcakes with white, orange, green, blue, and yellow medium consistency icing.

Ladybug: On orange iced cupcake, use spatula to imprint a line down the center of the body.  Use tip 12 and black icing to pipe dot head.  Use tip 2 and white icing to pipe dot eyes, nose, and outline mouth.  Use tip 2 and black icing to pipe dot pupils and dots on body. Cut black shoestring licorice and insert for antennas.

Rainbow: On white iced cupcake, use tip 5 and violet, pink, blue, green, and yellow icing to pipe rainbow and sun.  Cut 2 white miniature marshmallows into 1/4 squares and add for clouds.

Fish: On blue iced cupcake, use tip 12 and orange icing to pipe dot body.  Use tip 3 and green icing to pipe zigzag tail, fin, gills, bead mouth, and sea weed.  Use tip 2 and white icing to pipe dot eye and tip 2 and black icing to pipe dot pupil.

Teddy Bear: On yellow iced cupcake, use tip 12 and brown icing to pipe dot head.  Use tip 5 and brown icing to pipe dot ears and muzzle.  Use tip 3 and black icing to pipe dot eyes, nose, and outline mouth.   Use tip 3 and multiple colored icing to pipe dot confetti.

Worm: On white iced cupcake, use tip 5 and green icing to pipe increasing sizes of dots from tail to head.  Use tip 3 and white icing to pipe dot eyes, tip 2 and black icing to pipe dot pupils and outline mouth, tip 2 and green icing to pipe dot nose.

Cyclops: On light green iced cupcake, use tip 3 and dark green icing to pipe dots.  Use tip 3 and black icing to outline and pipe-in mouth.  Use tip 3 and white icing to pipe dot eye and tooth.  Use tip 3 and black icing to pipe dot pupil.  Cut black shoestring licorice and insert for hair.

Princess and the Frog Cake

 

 

Princess and the Frog cake was made using the frozen buttercream transfer technique instead of the piping technique used in Wilton Course 1 Lesson 2.

 

I found a coloring page of Princess Tiana.  I traced the picture using a black sharpie so that the picture would show through on the other side of the paper.  I turned the picture over to the transverse side and taped it to the back of a cookie cutter sheet.  I then covered the picture with wax paper and piped the outline with black icing.  I filled in the colors with brown, red, and green icing.  I completely covered the back with white icing.  The picture was placed in the freezer for about 90 minutes.  After it was completely frozen, I placed the picture on top of the cake and outlined the design in white and placed  the green zigzag border taught in lesson 2 around the cake using Wilton Tip 18. 

Teddy Bear Cake

Lesson 1 teaches about choosing the right pan, preparing cake pans, mixing batter, filling the pans, testing for doneness, removing the cakes, making icing, preparing the bags with couplers, leveling the cakes, icing the cake, and decorating tips.

 

I made the icing according to the recipe in the book and decided to use it for practicing since I don't really care for the taste or texture.  I was pretty familiar with preparing my bag with the tip and coupler as I learned it from the class last year.  My practice with using the star tip went well.

 

My final product for this lesson: The Teddy Bear Cake



 

Materials Used:

 

Wilton's teddy bear pan

 

Star Tip 18

 

Candy eyes (found at Wal-Mart)

 

Decorating candy string for the mouth and to outline the feet (found at Wal-Mart)

 

Chocolate chip morsels for the nose, mouth, and nails

 

Homemade Cream Cheese icing

 

Wilton brown, blue, and red food coloring paste

 

Lessons Learned

 

Cream cheese icing gets soft really quickly and makes it difficult to pipe designs.  I had to keep refrigerating the icing to harden it up so the bear took quite a while to decorate.

 

Use dark cocoa powder in icing to help cut down on needing to use so much food coloring.

 

Make sure to release bag before lifting tip.  This helps with getting a better shape for the stars.